3 Steps to Better Chinese Press Release Headlines

2012 has already seen a steady increase in the number of Chinese press releases my team is handling; up from the 12,000 or so seen in 2011. Now, I’m obviously delighted to see our traffic continue to increase, especially given the impressive growth in releases that we see from internationally-based companies looking to generate exposure in China; however, there is a strikingly important observation that I would like to share with everyone – writing a great English headline doesn’t automatically translate into a great Chinese headline.

This observation is a simple truth that is often overlooked. Of course, writing a great press release headline is always going to be tough when you don’t read or write the language in question, but the solution is actually rather simple. However, before I get to that solution, here are some general tips on how to write findable Chinese headlines:

1. Don’t Include Any English

Clearly, you’re unlikely to see this tip in a post about writing English headlines, but I’ve put this as the number one point to consider when writing Chinese headlines for a reason. English just doesn’t work. Not only do the vast majority of people in China not speak English, most journalists do not speak English either. This means that any English content, like your company name, is nothing but letters on a page for most people, and should the reader/editor be intrigued enough to translate it, you can guarantee that not everyone will translate it the same way. This results in many other branding and communication issues down the road, so it just makes sense to provide Chinese at the beginning to ensure consistency and reduce the chance of translation errors and mixed messaging.

You should also remember that English words take up much more room than Chinese words do, and this has a major (negative) impact on headline length and SEO results.

2. Keep to 20 Characters or Less

Headline length should also be a major focus of your messaging in China. While you may be able to get away with longer headlines in English (Google looks at the first 65 characters), too many of China’s news portals and websites will block content if the headline is too long. Even though China’s leading search engine, Baidu.com, will search the first 30 or so characters (roughly the same as 65 English characters), the major news portals have already begun blocking releases with headlines over 20-22 characters.

This is a key point many of our Chinese clients accept, because they understand the importance of the big four portals (SINA, SOHU, Tencent and NetEase), but many international clients do not. Of course, it’s perfectly normal to insist that the Chinese translation of your headline be an exact match to the English, but if your English headline is too long, the Chinese will not get far. As such, allowing for a shorter Chinese headline should be a key component of your Chinese communications strategy. Besides, you can always include sub-headings to add more information, if needed.

3. Keywords Should Come Early

Similar to your English headlines, keywords should come early. You still need to focus on writing for people rather than computers, but keywords remain a key part of your headline, sub-head and opening paragraph. Baidu doesn’t dig as deep as Google, so getting them in early is imperative.

It’s also important to remember you’re trying to communicate with a Chinese audience, so you need to think about what keywords and terms work best for them. Baidu does offer a keyword tool and its Baidu index, but it’s not going to be easy without the right expertise, and presuming a direct translation of your English keywords is accurate by default could be a mistake, especially if you don’t have an experienced and trusted translation company. That said, by using the Baidu Index you have a free tool that allows you to check trends to enable you to better select keywords, while the paid keyword tool offers a good alternative for those willing to spend to get ahead.

Overall…

If you utilize these three tips, you should find yourself on the fast-track to Chinese headline success, but rather than simply take my word for it, here’s some evidence that should leave you without any doubt about the points being made:

News Headlines From China’s 4 Major News Portals

Even if you don’t read Chinese, there should be two things apparent from
the above headlines, as taken from China’s four leading news portals: the
headlines have zero English and are under 20-22 characters

And so, where does this leave you, if you can’t read or write Chinese? Time for that simple solution I mentioned…

We here at PR Newswire understand the media landscape in China, and we understand how important it is for you to get your message across as you initially intended. PR Newswire is actively engaged in helping clients write better Chinese headlines, so if your headline is in need of a quick fix, allow our team of native specialists to help. Don’t let a fear of the Chinese language hinder your efforts to get noticed in China.